Wednesday, March 23, 2022

Roman Holiday (1953)

Rome has become a refuge from the trauma of the pandemic years and from the looming threat of war in Europe. For an American stepping off the plane at Fiumicino, The Eternal City is a little like a spa. In this case the treatment offered being antiquity. With the threat of upcoming midterm elections in which Republicans are likely to gain control of the house, co-morbidity is no longer the right word to describe the constant deluge of adverse events. First it was Trump and the coronavirus. Now it’s war and the refugee crisis. In Rome sirens perpetually wail, with an unmistakable Roman cast to their Doppler effect, screeching followed by birds tweeting. Remember “pack up your troubles?"  The mantra here might include a walk through Hadrian’s tomb or the Caracalla Baths, as a way of taking a breather from the woes of a world on fire. Is it perspective? Is it the realization that ruins   become a source of beauty? In The Decameron Boccaccio’s Fiorentines endure the plague by telling stories to each other as a source of solace. Now the past is offered as a salvo, and a reminder that civilization will survive.

read Love Expands and quotes by Francis Levy

and watch the animation of Erotomania


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